So, I was about 13 or 14 when I gave fantasy fiction writing my first real go. It was going to be a novel.

Frankly, it was crap. But I have a soft spot for it, because it was my first try, and because I think that, all things considered, it showed promise for a 13 year old girl's first try. And if nothing else, it was an important step on my little journey as a writer.

It's not pretty or lovely. It's ugly and harsh, and cold and vicious. It's the legacy of our ancestors, the murderous apes who came down from the trees, and lived and died and survived. Survived the cold, the heat, the brink of extinction.

The sentiments of "never give up", and "die trying" spring from it. The sentiment of "at all costs" comes from it, too. It's twisted, and hideous, and noble and wonderful, all at once.

It's got nothing to do with our civilised abstractions; it's purely animal, and it's what really drives us, what drove us from the trees to the ground, from the ground, to the air, from the air, to the stars.

It's vicious and nasty and strong and amazing and powerful. But not pretty.

Probably best to call it fiction. It's not, but it's not non-fiction, so here we are.

Ships of Exploration

Once upon a time, we sailed the oceans, in royal ships with sails and rigging. We've tamed the ocean, learned her ways and we've harnessed the earth to power our boats, no longer are we bound to the winds and their fickle ways.

There's little left for us, on the oceans. There's things yet undiscovered, but there is no romance left, we've sucked her dry.

And perhaps that is good. The men who sailed the oceans, when 'once upon a time' was 'now', would have killed for what we take for granted.

The ocean was a cruel and powerful mistress, but we rose up, revolted, and now she is an ill-tempered but unimportant sidenote. We have gone quite literally over her authority, with our planes and helicopters. She strikes at us with storms and fury, but even that is ineffective--we have gone so far as to even to learn the weather's patterns.

We sail the oceans no more. They are not happy subjects, but we rule them, now.

Where is the ocean, now? Where is the untamed unknown?

Beyond the bright, blue sky.

The ocean we shall sail in the future is an inky black one, and it holds terrors we've yet to imagine. Space is the final unknown, the last place left for us to explore--we've explored and conquered the planet.

It baffles me that we've come so far and yet we shy back from this last frontier. Would that I could, I would go, right now. I would sail the ocean of the sky, and face the terrors that accompany it.

Would that I could...

But others wouldn't. And therefore I cannot, for there is no ship to sail the stars. We dream about it, write about it, fictionalize its first forays, but no one has built a starship, no one yet will try.

I'll have to build my own, and find a few who would sail with me. And perhaps I will never sail the stars, perhaps it will be my daughter, or her daughter.

But I swear you this, my family shall fly and so shall others. The whole of humanity shall fly!

Current Mood:determined

Current Music:we go to space on wings of steel and fuel of fiery spirit

What be the creatures of myth? Pure imagination? The musings of deranged minds? Pretty falsehoods and lovely untruths to amuse children?

Many call them fictional because they lack the words. They are not 'real', but neither are they unreal, they are merely other. Other-real, and wishing to stay that way, for what a dull place our reality is. Who would want to live among dullards who cannot feel the truth of unicorns and the reality of dragons? Certainly not I--though it seems I have less choice than our mythical friends.

The creatures of myth exist. Ride a unicorn and fly upon a dracogriff. Go see the world, young adventurer--not ours, but theirs!

I've started a bit early on my new year's resolution to write. This isn't long, but it's something.

The Mirror In The Attic

There was a mirror in the attic. As everyone knows, mirrors are scary things--is the mirror you real? What does she do when he isn't looking back at you? Does she wonder the same things about you that you wonder about her? Scary things to think about.

The children of Agdern House didn't mind the mirror. In fact, they loved it. There were pretty clothes and jewelry in the trunk beside it, and when the children put them on, even if they didn't fit right, the mirror showed them decked out like kings and queens.

The teens of Agdern House rolled their eyes whenever the children waxed on about the mirror. They could remember having down the same themselves--and not one could remember why he'd thought it so special, not so many years ago. It was just an old, battered mirror, with ridiculous ornamentation and a bunch of frilly clothes in the trunk beside it.

The adults of Agdern House hated the mirror. Not many of them had seen the mirror as children and teens--it's a rare orphan who will stick around the orphanage he was forced to grow up in. The adults had no fond memories, they would not wear the clothing, and the mirror never flattered them. That is why it had been stashed away in the attic in the first place, where no one would have to see it.

The people of Agdern House, child, teen and adult, are notoriously difficult to hoodwink and do quite well in the world. No matter what shows in the mirror, with the ornate, but worn decoration that might once have spelled a name that started with what might have been an M, it is never a true reflection of reality.